In the second session that I did with the Goalkeeper, we both decided together to work on his throwing skills and aiming. We decided it would be best to set out some targets for him to throw at so he could improve his skill as well as aim. Whilst he was doing some of his throws, I noticed that he did not throw from his shoulder or even overarm for that matter, so as he went along, I asked him to show me how he felt he was throwing the ball, he shown me a way which was not how he was throwing it at all. This indicated to me that he did not realize exactly what he was doing and that was why he could not get the distance or target correct. Sometime when he was throwing the ball, he would find that it was hurting him because he was trying to hard to get the power and the distance correct “using the correct technique, for example, in rugby, soccer or hockey, prevents injury to yourself or other players” (K, Bizley. 2002). So ensuring that the Goalkeeper was able to use the correct technique was vital in making sure that he or other players did not get hurt when he was throwing the ball out. I thought that this session was important to him as a goalkeeper at his age because he was at the age where I was able to interpret his technique into a better one to help to prevent injury but also enhance his throwing skills so that the ball could get further and to the right target intended rather that just throwing the ball out to anywhere so anybody could get the ball. In the next game I watched him play, there was a vast improvement for his throwing skills, most of the time, the ball got to where he intended to throw it, from what I could see, although sometimes, he did look as though he did not mean it to go where it got to, but was still happy with the outcome. This in my opinion is great for not only him but the whole team as they needed to start to get the ball from their keeper to give them the best chances for goal; opportunities.
When he had gotten used to throwing the ball to particular targets that I had put all around the sports hall, I then turned his attention to kicking the ball out for a goal kick. Again working on the same as the throw, with kicking technique and aiming skills, we went out onto the football pitch and chose different spots that he could kick the ball from to get used to kicking the ball long and short distances whilst on a pitch and not indoors. We went outside mostly for safety reasons as the sports hall is not big enough for the children to practice kicking a football like a goalkeeper. “safety management is a vital factor in sport” (Watt, D. 2004) There are a number of factors that have to be evaluated whilst people participate in sports, so ensuring that the environment is safe and controlled for all participants is important to all coaches, parents and participants. We went onto different parts of the field and I told him that he had to chose which part of his foot he should use and how much he needed to put into the ball to get it to its intended target. Going through various spots, I found that he always wanted to use the inside of his foot, which is good for an outfield player, but for a goalkeeper, he needed to get used to using the front of his foot to be able to get the power behind the ball. Setting out targets around the field meant that he had to do the decision making himself which would get him used to being able to do that within a game, to ensure that he made the right decisions in games whilst under pressure, I decided to put him under just a bit of pressure to give him some confidence when going into games because he would be used to having that pressure put on him by me or even somebody else that could potentially come out and help.
Both of these skills proved to be essential throughout the game that he next played on the Saturday, as they were against one of the toughest teams in their league, this enabled the keeper to keep calm under the situation and make the right decisions throughout his game. This training session for me was a learning curve too, as I was able to adapt what I was going to do in that session to provide more information and results for the keeper. At first I had only planned to let his work on his throwing and kicking technique, but when I realized that he could not get the ball to me most of the time, I realized that I needed to change the skill to include aiming technique too. This did not disrupt him in anyway, shape or form, but only immensely changed the way his thinks about his goal kicks or throwing. If I could do this session again I would make sure that he was outside for the whole of the sessions, or involve other team mates so that we wasn’t constantly doing the same thing, I found the session tedious myself, so if I did, then of course the participant is going to. I*f I involved all of the participants, I could do a whole part whole session or add in different elements to take this keepers mind of what he is doing but still involve his technique in the skills that I would do instead. This would keep the keeper more involved and active whilst still learning a new or better technique.
Reflection 